Soul Rider
by Shezzi
Summary: The Doctor and Rose take a slight mis-step on their way...somewhere, and meet a rather fascinating girl. Crossover with BtVS.


A/N: I've been struggling to continue my current stories, and I know there are a lot of them. This was itching in my head, and I hoped that if I wrote it down it might help. Please read and review, let me know what you think! Love xx Shezzi

The Doctor and Rose stepped out of the TARDIS, glancing around.

"You brought me to a cemetery?" asked Rose, wrinkling her nose.

"Not where I was aiming, all right?" he asked, slightly embarrassed, running a hand through his messy brown hair.

"Where were you aiming?" she asked, curious.

"Weeellll," he said, drawing the word out. He hadn't told her where they were going, had wanted it to be a surprise, just a fun day out with no one trying to kill them.

"Doctor," Rose pleaded, weaving her fingers through his and leaning her head against his shoulder, staring up at him, making her eyes go wider.

"Ohhhh, no. No, when we find out where we are and why we're here we'll deal with it and then we are still going on our day out. So there!" He grinned down at her and she pouted, but he resolutely turned away. "On that note, how about we see where we are?"

"Or, you could just turn around and die," hissed a slightly distorted voice from behind them.

The Doctor whirled, pulling Rose tightly against him as he peered in the dimly lit gloom. The moon was only a sliver, and the trees and walls blocked out most of the ambient light from the street lamps.

"Oh, seriously," drawled a female voice off in the shadows. "You guys really need to come up with some better lines; it makes me feel redundant when I try to pun with you!" A girl, who looked to be in her late teens, sauntered onto the path, her blond hair catching what light there was.

"Who are you?" demanded the man, staring at her derisively.

"Are you serious? How old are you, two nights? Where's your sire?" demanded the blond, staring at the man. "You know what, never mind. Let me give you the run down. You vampire, me Slayer, this stake, you...dust." She had been sauntering casually towards the guy, until she pulled out the stake. Then it was like watching greased lightening; she ducked under his arm, punched him once in the face and slammed the stake home in his chest.

She turned to face the couple, dusting herself off slightly. "You two really shouldn't be out here right now...wait a minute..." she stepped slightly closer, frowning. "Two hearts? Which one of you has two hearts?" she asked, wrinkling her nose in confusion.

"Oh, you are magnificent," said the Doctor, stepping forward and peering at the girl. "Totally wrong, and completely illegal, but still, you're fantastic...and I really have to remember not to use that word, it just doesn't sound right with these teeth." He pulled his glasses out and snapped them open, slipping them on.

"Excuse me?" said the blond, confusion written all over her face.

"You can drop the innocent 'I don't know what you're talking about act,'" the Doctor said, his tone somewhat harder. "What you are doing to that girl is banned under sections 7, 11 and 14 of the Shadow Proclamation. Soul riding is illegal, not to mention punishable by death."

"What the bloody hell are you talking about? God, I have to stop spending so much time with Spike, next thing you know I'll be using words like 'ponce' and calling Angel 'Peaches'," she muttered under her breath. She turned her attention back to the Doctor and Rose. "Now, what are you?" she demanded, circling carefully, giving the Doctor a wide birth and coming to a stop where she knew she could grab the girl, who read as completely human, out of the way. "You're definitely not human, but she is, so what are you planning to do with her?"

"Well, I was trying to take her on a fun trip, but we didn't end up quite where I was planning," replied the Doctor, still peering at the blond.

"You do realize he's not human, don't you?" the blond quickly asked Rose.

"What of it?" demanded the Londoner, glaring at the other woman.

"Just making sure. I'm not one to throw stones, my house has WAY too many windows for that," replied the other girl.

"I'm Rose and he's the Doctor, who are you?" asked Rose, curious.

"Buffy," replied the blond.

Rose and the Doctor glanced at each other before snorting with laughter.

"HEY!" came the cry from the outraged slayer.

"Oh, sorry, thought you were having us on there," said Rose contritely, pressing her lips together tightly.

"Still, what you're doing to that girl is wrong," the Doctor said, getting back on his original tack.

"I am this girl, have been for the past twenty-one years, Doctor," replied Buffy, glaring.

"No, you haven't been attached to her for longer than six, at the most," replied the Doctor. "Your bonds to her soul don't go deeper than that. Although...now, that's weird," he said, stepping forward and peering closer.

He pulled out a different pair of glasses, with odd lenses, and slipped them on. "No, that's strange, you're actually telling the truth...it's like it's been bound to you, but it's not controlling you. You stronger than most people? Have violent urges? A need to go out and destroy things? Probably started around the time you were fifteen?"

"Well, duh, like you wouldn't be able to find all that out from asking around," replied Buffy, annoyed now. "What, you wanted to rub my face in the fact that I'm the longest living Slayer?"

"Slayer?" asked the Doctor, his true confusion apparent.

"One girl in all the world, a chosen one, she alone has the strength and skill to fight the vampires, demons and the forces of darkness, she is the Slayer, she who hangs out a lot in graveyards, any of this ringing a bell?"

"Ahhh..." said the Doctor delicately. "No, sorry," he said a second later, wrinkling his nose. "But, you said one, and that you're one of the longest lived. If I'm right about what I'm seeing, and I normally am right because I'm very, very smart, this thing is bound to you until your death, at which point it will seek out another host. Whoever did this has broken almost every section of the Shadow Proclamation, first by putting a soul rider on you, second by binding another creature to their will. And I don't know if I can do anything about it."

"Scared old men who didn't want to fight their own battles," Buffy spat, her disgust apparent. "So they chained a girl in the middle of the desert and forced a demon inside of her, to make her do it for them. And when she died, there was the next, and the next. We live, we fight, we die, the next comes along and does the same." Her voice was bitter.

"I'm sorry, I'm so, so sorry," the Doctor's eyes were deep with pity.

"It's my life. I've adapted. I have to go, got three other new burials to clear before the sun rises. You shouldn't stay out here, it's not safe, particularly not now. You got somewhere to go?" she asked, glancing between them.

"Yeah, we'll just go back inside and...try again," Rose said, jerking her head at the TARDIS.

"But, I might be able to help," the Doctor said, still frowning at Buffy.

"The Slayer is needed. I might not like it, I certainly don't like the Council, the men who think they control the Slayer, but I am needed. Who would save the world every apocalypse season?"

"You have an apocalypse season?" asked Rose, giggling.

"Around June, generally. We think it's the heat; drives the bad guys mad." She glanced over her shoulder, then grinned. "Sorry, gotta go kill something else." She turned and left the graveyard, leaving two very confused people behind. At least, one very confused person, and one slightly despondent, depressed person.

"Doctor, what was that?" asked Rose, frowning.

"Come inside, and I'll explain what I can," the Doctor replied, leading her back to the TARDIS.

Once inside, Rose sat on pilot's chair. "You going to explain what that was all about?" she asked, curious.

"Okaaaay...soul rider. Imagine a cross between the Gelth and the psychograft Cassandra used on you and you have a soul-rider. It's illegal: it only works on a living body, and completely suppresses the host consciousness. But she...was something else," he shook his head. "Someone...trapped a soul rider and bound it to her, giving her all the physical advantages without most of the downsides. She's stronger, faster, heals better and has better senses than any human in existence. The downside is that she's more feral, has a higher level of aggression. That's how the soul-rider feeds, it gathers the energy from her kills. It seems she only targets non-humans. Funny, I remember something very vague about this, but I'm sure I should know more...it's like I'm not meant to know, and that bothers me." He shook his head and dismissed it.

"Come on, let's try again," he said, jumping up, dismissing the strange girl from his mind, the subtle magics that were intended to hide the Slayer from such people already effecting his mind. Rose frowned, but shrugged, and dismissed it.

"So, where are we going?" asked Rose again, biting her lip and looking at the Doctor through her lashes.

"Why don't you open the door and see?" he grinned at her.

She opened it and leaned out before pulling back and looking at him, giggling slightly. "Disney Land?"

"YESSSS!" cried the Doctor with success, grabbed her hand and dragged her out the door.


End file.
